Welcome to theTDA4advisors Blog

We are excited to share a collection of relevant, timely, and insightful articles that can help you grow and strengthen your business. TD Ameritrade and leading industry experts will be contributing their unique perspectives on the challenges and opportunities that RIAs are facing today. Thank you for joining our community and we look forward to connecting with you!

By now, you know that I believe internships are one of the most meaningful ways to bring much-needed NextGen talent to the RIA industry. I’ve used data, research, surveys — anything I could get my hands on — to help tell this story.

Now I’m bringing insight straight from people who know, first-hand, just how important internships are – not only to the future of the industry, but to your business. I reached out to two leaders at firms with fantastic, long-standing internship programs: Heather Fortner from SignatureFD, LLC in Atlanta and Lawrence Becker from JNBA Financial Advisors in Minneapolis.

While both are geographically fortunate to have multiple local colleges and universities with robust financial planning programs from which to source talent, the insight they share can benefit someone looking to start or beef up an internship experience.

Freshly cleaned cube: check. System logins set up: check. Tour the break room and share parking info: check, check. Welcome aboard! Good luck and see you at your annual review. Now I can scratch “hire NextGen talent” from my to-do list.

Okay, that’s a bit extreme. But you get my point. We know it’s important to hire NextGen advisors (and I’ll remind you later of a few of those reasons). But developing people — fostering a meaningful, robust career — is a crucial piece of the puzzle that is lacking among RIA firms and I’m going to focus on today.

Every year, it happens pretty quickly for me. I finally adjust to the slower pace of August and, blink!, it’s fall conference season in full force. My next few months will be packed with events where I’ll be meeting new people, running into old friends, and doing my favorite thing: “AdvoKating” for the future of our industry.

But first, I want to share a highlight that happens at the end of every summer. Our interns put their heads together and come up with a “Capstone” project. They present their big idea to Tom Nally, President, TD Ameritrade Institutional, and his leadership team. Each year they impress me and my colleagues with their unique perspectives and the hard work they put into this effort.

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